Istanbul
Saltwater
As a migration crisis unfolded in Turkey (refugees on rubber rafts were trying to reach Greece from the Turkish coast), a biennial titled “Saltwater” seemed an amazing coincidence. But innocuous as the title appeared, the theme encompassed political, spiritual, mystical, and scientific metaphors reaching back into history through the present and into the future. “Tuzlu su” (“Saltwater”) featured venues that could not be seen, installations in obscure locations, and ferry trips to the Princes Islands in the Sea of Marmara and up the Bosphorus. The organizer of the 14th Istanbul Biennial, Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, who referred to her role as drafting a “composition,” took on the metaphor of saltwater as a synonym for “transformation and change on the planet…It is a theory of life.” …see the entire review in the print version of March’s Sculpture magazine.
